Bergamini: A Landscape with No Borders

I come from a family of shipmasters. I was born and raised in a seaside town on the coast of Tuscany, and I cannot imagine living far from the water. Vessels are familiar to me. My grandfather traveled extensively in the Mediterranean. My father, during his career, visited five continents, always after spendings weeks in the middle of the immense blue.

I have been thinking about how water connects my two lands: Italy, site of my origins, and New York City, where I have chosen to live. This city, for me, symbolizes the openness of that horizon I grew up with. My background, mixed with my experience of this metropolis, gives shape to my sense of belonging. I like to say that I am an Etruscan, deeply rooted in my land, Tuscany. At the same time, after almost 20 years, I feel I am a New Yorker, gratefully connected to this incredibly enriching community.

And from the geography of my origins combined with the expansion of my view in New York City comes the necessity to describe a landscape with no borders—a place from where we all come from, all belong, and eventually go back—the eternal cosmic waters. This is a landscape I started to meditate upon in my series Fons et Origo ( Source and Origin in Latin) and expanded in my I Will Meet You There series. The boat symbolizes a passage: our coming into birth, journeying through life, and eventually leading to our last crossing.